Rhea Lisondra is a Carleton Journalism and Humanities alumna. As a journalist, she hopes to give a platform to underrepresented voices. She is a reporter at Street Voices and New Canadian Media. She is also a Co-Host on the podcast AZN Connection.
Recently, Rhea was live on our show talking about her article Action Needed to Resolve Canada’s Growing Anti-Asian Racism Problem.
During our conversation, Rhea talked about:
– Her background and the challenges she faces growing up in Canada
– The lessons and qualities her parents have given her that make her who she is today
– The response her family had to her wanting to go into journalism
– Her first day of journalism school versus her graduation day, and her struggles she faced in college.
– The background behind the article Action Needed to Resolve: Canada’s Growing Anti-Asian Racism Problem and why she wrote the article
– Pushback she faced when writing the article and how she felt after finishing the article
– The day-to-day challenges in the Asian community and “imposter syndrome”.
– Comparison of younger generations talking about the issues the Asian communities face versus elder generations
– Her concern for underrepresentation of underrepresentation in media, and her ideal vision of the Canadian media landscape
– The AZN Connection Podcast
– Younger generations thoughts on Anti-Asian Racism and how they are handling it
– Her thoughts on the Canadian media landscape
– The most common misconceptions about Asian People.
– Calls to actions she has for people when it comes to Anti-Asian Racism
You can contact Rhea via Instagram @rhealisondra/
Listen to the audio-only version:
Watch the full conversation:
Transcript provided by YouTube (unedited):
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[Music]
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[Music]
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what is up everybody it’s dr vibe here
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host and producer of the award-winning
00:35
doctor vibe show
00:36
the home of epic conversations and i’m
00:38
the host of epic conversations
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2020 best podcast news award winner
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2018 innovation award winner that will
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come into some prominence in a few
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moments there’s a there’s a connection
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here tonight with
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with those two well yeah there is a
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connection with those awards also
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i host the only online show in the world
00:56
for fathers and dads it’s sponsored by
00:59
dove men care it’s also co-sponsored by
01:01
dad central
01:02
and actually we’re broadcasting live
01:04
here on april 20th
01:05
i had the pleasure earlier on today of
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interviewing two really important sports
01:10
people in canadian media one gentleman
01:12
named jack armstrong
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if you watch any of the toronto raptors
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he’s a color commentator
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for tsn for the toronto raptors he also
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does a lot of stuff also
01:21
for nba tv and i also had donovan
01:24
bennett who is a
01:26
contributor at sportsnet and we had a
01:29
great conversation about fatherhood so
01:30
if you want to get
01:31
access to that conversation touch base
01:34
with me i’ll make sure you get it they
01:35
were
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fantastic they hit out of the park we
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had a lot of fun
01:39
but let’s forget about that you know i
01:42
do one other thing amongst other things
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these days
01:44
i also am the board chair of an
01:46
organization called the global food and
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drink initiative
01:49
it’s a multimedia not-for-profit that is
01:53
showcasing blocks in the diaspora
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they’re involved in food wine and travel
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as always i’d like to say you’re blessed
01:58
highly favored a magnet for miracles and
02:00
a solution for someone’s problem
02:02
thank you everyone just right from the
02:04
beginning who are watching live
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or watching on the replay or gonna be
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listening to the replay
02:10
i love bringing new people onto the dr
02:13
vibe show
02:14
if you’re been around a bit you know i
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like doing that
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now this young lady
02:20
a few months ago reached out to me
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and saying dr vibe i’d like to interview
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you and i go
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you don’t have an exciting life
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why would you want to interview me so
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joking aside
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uh she wanted to interview me about one
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of the recent awards
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i received from the canadian ethnic
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media association the
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best podcast news award and just a
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little bit about dr vibe
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and right from the first time i spoke
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with her on the phone
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i said you know what i want to help you
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anyway you can i can
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and i want to help you win so tonight we
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have
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a young lady who i feel is a budding
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superstar
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in acadian media scene so let me give
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you a little background
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ria lisandra is a carlton universe a
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cult in journalism
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and humanities alumna i thought you used
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to say alumni
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alumni okay as a journalist she hopes to
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give a platform to unrepresented voices
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she’s a reporter at street voices which
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is a great online publication please
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check it out streetvoices.ca
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and new canadian media she is also the
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coast
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co-host of a podcast called the a z
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n connection i was told to be correct
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with that so i don’t want to
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get rid real mad at me so she’s going to
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be on
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our show tonight and she’s going to be
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on a few seconds talking about a great
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article she wrote called
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action needed to resolve canada’s
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growing anti-racism problem so we’d like
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to welcome for the first time
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but not the last time riya
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we’re gonna bring ria onto the stage
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what’s going on i’m good how are you
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i am blessed highly favored imagine for
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miracles and a solution for someone’s
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problem
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and i didn’t you know what i knew as i
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said from the first time i
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met you i said somewhere in your career
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somewhere in your journey
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you are going to be here and look at
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that
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that’s right i really do appreciate you
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taking the time to to have me on today i
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really appreciate that
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absolutely and i and i think it’s an
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interesting day for a number of reasons
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uh
04:27
yes it’s a significant day with the
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george floyd derek chaven trial
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in regards to uh racism police
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conduct etc but racism
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isn’t fixated to one culture
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racism is an issue that many of us
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experience not just people who look like
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me and people who look like you
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so i thought and we didn’t plan it this
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way
04:54
that we’re talking about racism today
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but maybe a racism that a lot of people
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aren’t aware with
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and about and one of the goals i always
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want to do with this platform is educate
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and
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inform inspire and uh
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definitely the education and the
05:10
information that you’re going to provide
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for tonight will be very meaningful i
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think to many people who are watching
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and listening to our conversations so
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thank you for taking the time
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of course of course good well let’s find
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out about uh life before you were a
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journalist so
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like young rio what’s what was young
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well you’re still young you know you’re
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much you’re probably much younger than
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me
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but um where you grew up life growing up
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etc with our audience
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yeah sure i mean i guess like if we go
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way back
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um i was born in manila philippines
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so my family immigrated to canada when i
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was fairly young
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i came to canada when i was like about
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one almost two years old
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and i was raised in a small not so small
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town now
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actually but at trenton ontario not sure
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if anyone listening is
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familiar with that area but uh in
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growing up in that area
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it was pretty predominantly white at the
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time so
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anyone who was like not a non-white
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person i probably would have known of
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them like there were very few of us
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growing up
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and that honestly influenced me a lot um
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to to be in the field that i am in now
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because i had always felt this sense of
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wanting to build representation that i
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couldn’t find in mainstream media
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and that really pushed me to wanting to
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be in journalism and and now i got my
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start going to
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carlton so i know we were going to start
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with like how i’m not
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my early days before journalism but
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really i feel like
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those early days kind of lead up to to
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my identity as a journalist
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wonderful can you just share some of the
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challenges your family had
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growing up and i know trenton been there
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but some of the challenges that
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your family had growing up in trinidad
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and
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and by the way i am i have a special
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love for the philippines i have a
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wonderful there’s some wonderful close
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people in my journey who are from the
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philippines so
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i do relate and uh beautiful place and
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beautiful people so
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thank you for that yeah um
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well struggles were
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i feel like something we didn’t really
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discuss and i think that’s something a
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lot of
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asian people can resonate with i think
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there wasn’t really
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something as part of our culture that
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allowed us to really
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talk about issues that affected us
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i think for me my general impact
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or my general like thing that i can take
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away that was a struggle was just trying
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to
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fit in knowing that i was in a town
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where i was always going to stand out
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because i didn’t look like the other
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kids
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or i didn’t act or eat the same food
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that they did so i
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kind of had this weird identity crisis
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of like knowing that i wasn’t going to
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fit in with the kids at school but then
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at home
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you know i didn’t really fit like the
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idea of being completely filipino either
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so there was this weird internal
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struggle of being like not canadian
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enough or not filipino or asian enough
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but that’s one struggle that i can think
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of for myself for my own family
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their struggle was more like trying to
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work as hard as they could in in a
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country that didn’t you know find their
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education and their skills and
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experiences
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out of canada valid so they worked very
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hard labor jobs their whole life to try
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to get me into a better school so that
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was more
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their struggle um that i can think of
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you know i i can actually relate to what
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you’re saying in regards to
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not being having an identity crisis
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my my cultural background both my
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parents are from jamaica
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uh and they basically said like
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you ain’t one of us but looking the way
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i
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do a lot of people in canada say you’re
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not one of us
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so i can understand how you had that um
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internal challenge and also
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external challenges probably that you
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had to deal with and also having the
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challenges
09:12
in in your like just day-to-day living
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how did you deal with it how did you
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overcome it
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i think the best way i i can say like i
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overcame it is just the way my parents
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and my family raised me
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they were always very proud of where
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they came from and despite working hard
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and like maybe not having the most
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glamorous life they
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did teach me to be proud of coming from
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that
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and that one day you know working hard
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you’ll get to
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somewhere better in life so that was the
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main motivation
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is just it might be hard right now but
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it would it should be better
09:49
later nice nice what
09:52
qualities and i and people who watch the
09:56
doctor visual i always ask this question
09:57
because i think it’s very important
09:59
what qualities have your parents
10:02
instilled in you that you carry on today
10:06
um that is a great question
10:09
yeah wow um i think
10:12
one of the main things my my parents
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have always
10:17
tried to teach me is to to be strong for
10:20
myself
10:21
because growing up i i definitely was
10:23
more of like a very sensitive and not
10:25
that that’s a bad thing but i was a very
10:26
sensitive child and things would really
10:28
get to me if
10:29
i couldn’t do things properly the right
10:32
way
10:32
so i really thank my parents for you
10:35
know not giving up on that and teaching
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me like it’s okay to feel that way
10:39
but you have to keep moving like you
10:40
cannot just give up on yourself right
10:42
away and let things get to you
10:44
so i think to sum that up i guess like a
10:46
sort of resilience or like a fighting
10:48
spirit to try to get
10:50
through things even though they may be
10:51
difficult um another thing is that they
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really
10:55
valued or like taught me to value
10:58
um standing my own ground and working
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hard despite
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you know maybe not having the best hand
11:05
um like i was saying earlier i i my
11:08
family worked really hard we i don’t
11:09
really come from
11:10
a rich or you know wealthy background
11:13
so and and i was kind of in social
11:16
circles where people did come from
11:18
well-off families and that also kind of
11:21
made me feel
11:23
like i stood out and was a little bit
11:24
different but they they
11:27
definitely taught me to to not let that
11:29
get to me as well and to just
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do what i can with what i have
11:34
excellent when you made the decision to
11:38
take
11:40
journalism
11:42
you know where i’m going with this yeah
11:44
okay so okay so
11:46
so you and i are relating we’re like
11:48
doing the telepathy thing
11:49
absolutely uh what was your parents
11:53
response when you said
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oh i want to do journalism because i
11:56
have a feeling
11:57
i have a feeling i’m not making i just
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have a feeling that it didn’t get
12:01
100 approval you’re not wrong
12:08
yeah it was it was first met with like a
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little bit of backlash i’m not gonna lie
12:13
like there was a little
12:14
hesitancy but it was um
12:18
it was justified like i i had chosen to
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be
12:22
announced that i wanted to be a
12:23
journalist at like a really rough time
12:25
for journalism like around the same time
12:27
where
12:27
you know there was a lot of stories
12:29
coming out about journalism journalism
12:31
people being attacked or targeted
12:32
and like i was right there in the middle
12:34
of it being like so i want to be them
12:36
my parents were like why would you do
12:39
that
12:40
but i kind of showed them the reasons i
12:44
had
12:44
for wanting to go into journalism as i
12:46
mentioned earlier the whole
12:47
representation thing
12:49
loving to see and learn about other
12:51
people’s cultures and stories and
12:53
wanting to share that with others and
12:54
they
12:55
came around to it eventually there was
12:57
still some hesitancy when i like went to
12:59
journalism school that they were like i
13:00
don’t know about this idea but
13:02
they eventually came around was it their
13:06
concern
13:07
that oh you’re not in a profession or
13:10
was it concerned that
13:12
oh we are cons certain about your safety
13:16
or your parents’s pushbacks at the time
13:20
i don’t think it was about a profession
13:22
i think my parents
13:24
very much respected journalists and
13:26
journalism
13:28
um and they often which i found funny is
13:30
growing up they often talk very
13:32
positively about journalists
13:34
which might have you know influenced me
13:36
to be like maybe that’s a career i could
13:38
take
13:38
i’m actually just thinking about that
13:39
right now but that might have been an
13:42
impact
13:42
they always talk positively about the
13:44
field but when
13:45
they heard that i wanted to be in it
13:47
they i guess there was a mode of
13:49
protection that kind of came in because
13:52
i am their only child as well so that
13:54
was that fact
13:55
about that okay good stuff good stuff
13:59
then uh how was education like
14:02
actually do you remember the first day
14:04
you you went into school
14:05
at uh in journalism what was your do you
14:08
remember your first day
14:09
i do remember my first day i remember
14:12
the orientation
14:13
and the first actual day of classes and
14:15
everything being like
14:16
so hectic and i was i remember being
14:19
very nervous
14:20
as well yeah and
14:24
the day you graduated tell us about that
14:27
day
14:28
well i graduated last year
14:32
in the global pandemic so
14:35
why i didn’t have a graduation i
14:37
finished
14:38
my undergrad in my bedroom which was
14:40
like so
14:41
weird why does that sound interesting i
14:44
finished my undergrad in my
14:46
yeah that make a very interesting movie
14:48
title
14:50
yeah it was like very underwhelming
14:53
conclusion to
14:54
like some of the most memorable four
14:56
years of my life but like
14:58
it was crazy to graduate into
15:01
you know the global pandemic in a field
15:03
where people already questioned its
15:05
stability
15:07
so that was interesting for sure can you
15:10
give us a moment during your
15:12
studies that was really tough and you
15:16
overcame it
15:18
um yeah i i definitely remember
15:21
immediately like
15:22
first year was probably the toughest
15:25
time for me
15:26
for a lot of different reasons like i
15:28
had never been
15:29
far away from my parents so like i said
15:31
i wasn’t i was
15:33
you know raised in trenton and ottawa is
15:35
like a good three-hour drive away
15:37
i have never been apart from my family
15:39
um and i had never really done anything
15:42
on
15:42
my own because i was so sheltered being
15:44
an only child
15:46
um so i was going through a lot of
15:48
transition of like i had been in the
15:50
same place for so long i’ve been relying
15:52
on the same people for so long and now
15:53
i’m on my
15:54
own um and i definitely went through
15:56
that
15:57
that thing that a lot of students do
15:58
when they’re in high school where they
16:00
were like used to getting good grades
16:01
and then they hit
16:02
university and like it’s a whole other
16:05
level yeah exactly your grades
16:07
sink and i remember being like so
16:09
disappointed in myself
16:11
about like the grades that i was getting
16:13
because i wouldn’t i had not been used
16:14
to to getting those grades
16:16
um and i remember thinking like i’m not
16:18
going to make it because there’s like a
16:19
cut off right
16:21
for journalism and carlton there is a
16:23
cut off at the end of the year
16:24
and for a split second like i didn’t
16:26
make it like i did not make the cut off
16:29
into second year
16:30
and i remember like freaking out not
16:32
wanting to disappoint my parents when
16:34
they already were like iffy about this
16:36
career
16:37
but somehow things worked out and i got
16:40
a letter
16:41
to come back so i was like out but then
16:43
i was back in
16:45
and that was a relief on me
16:48
like that moment kind of changed
16:50
everything and i remember just working
16:52
so hard after that
16:53
to never be in that position so that is
16:56
that was a really tough point
16:57
in my my university experience nice well
17:01
thank you for sharing that part of the
17:02
journey because
17:04
a lot of times people just look at the
17:05
end product and they don’t know what
17:07
people had to go through
17:09
to get to that end product uh there’s so
17:12
many different directions i can go here
17:14
like i could talk about
17:17
you know let’s
17:20
okay this is like there’s so many
17:22
different things so let i’m gonna
17:24
talk about the yeah let’s talk about the
17:26
articles
17:27
i was gonna also i was gonna talk about
17:28
what you feel about this data journalism
17:30
and all that
17:31
we’ll save that to the end let’s talk
17:33
about your article
17:35
sure you know action needed to resolve
17:38
canada’s growing anti-racism
17:39
problem why did you write it
17:43
great question i i wrote that because it
17:46
had been something
17:47
that had been more relevant
17:50
as time was going on like i’m gonna say
17:53
like the asian community
17:55
was aware that something was happening
17:57
very early on in the pandemic
18:00
and i remember talking to my asian
18:02
friends who are part of the asean
18:03
connection podcast which i’m sure we’ll
18:05
get to later
18:06
we were talking about that a lot about
18:08
how
18:09
if they had experienced anything if
18:11
people in our circle had experienced
18:13
anything
18:14
if we felt like it was ever going to go
18:15
away it was going to get worse like i
18:17
remember these were conversations in our
18:19
circle
18:20
but despite our community talking about
18:22
it amongst ourselves it wasn’t really
18:24
talked about
18:25
in mainstream media and i had joined
18:28
street voices a couple months maybe a
18:32
couple weeks before i had started to
18:33
write this article and this was like the
18:35
first article that i pitched
18:37
to them that i wanted to work on because
18:39
i just felt like
18:41
it was weird how slow the mainstream
18:44
media was to catch on to this story
18:46
um so i had been working on this story
18:49
for like four weeks trying to get into
18:51
research and trying to get people to
18:53
speak to me about it
18:54
to put the article together and
18:56
surprisingly it got a lot of attention
18:59
so
18:59
i was very happy to see that well i i
19:01
don’t know if
19:02
if it’s surprising because obviously
19:04
racism is quite the catch
19:06
issue these days uh let’s let’s find out
19:10
so it took you four weeks to write the
19:12
article take us through the journey
19:14
of writing was it easy getting
19:16
information was it easy to speak with
19:18
people
19:19
were there any bumps along the road
19:21
getting this to
19:22
where we see it today for sure um
19:26
i was in a weird spot when i first
19:29
started like
19:30
reaching out to people because as i had
19:32
mentioned like not a lot of people were
19:34
talking about it but by the time i was
19:35
writing this it was getting more
19:37
attention so the people that i was
19:39
trying to reach out to were very busy
19:41
because other media outlets
19:43
were catching on finally um so i
19:46
remember like trying to reach out to
19:48
people but that they were busy because
19:50
of other media outlets and then i’d have
19:51
to like keep
19:52
following up with people um getting the
19:55
police to get back to me about any
19:56
reports that they had or what they were
19:58
doing
19:59
um i remember uh one of the sources in
20:02
the story who is the co-founder of the
20:04
project
20:04
1907 that provided data for the report
20:07
that i’m talking about
20:09
um i remember reaching out to her like
20:12
from the start of the month and then i
20:13
had to
20:14
like reach i had to keep reaching out to
20:16
her because she had gotten
20:17
like drowned in and um requests from
20:20
media because it suddenly got
20:22
so uh it got picked up a lot now so she
20:26
was
20:27
everyone that i was trying to reach out
20:28
to is now getting interviewed whereas
20:30
when i first reached out to them there
20:31
wasn’t a lot of people yet
20:33
so there was a weird scheduling conflict
20:36
with that
20:37
what do you feel or what do you
20:38
speculate
20:40
was the from no interest to
20:44
lots of interest what do you feel there
20:46
was a reason behind that
20:49
i think it was and i kind of hinted at
20:52
it in the article
20:53
as that the tragic atlanta shooting that
20:56
happened
20:57
um where eight people died six of them
21:00
being asian women i think
21:02
that was the point in which people
21:06
started to realize this was
21:08
a huge issue before then i think
21:11
whenever it was asian and asian
21:14
anti-asian
21:15
hate incidents before then were kind of
21:18
treated as like this happened over here
21:20
and this happened over here but like
21:22
there was never
21:24
a connection of it being a bigger issue
21:26
it was just like a string of single
21:28
incidents that happened throughout north
21:30
america
21:31
but it wasn’t until a bigger tragedy hit
21:35
that people finally realized that it
21:38
wasn’t just
21:39
singular incidents this was a growing
21:41
problem and a pattern
21:44
i want to i’m going to come back to the
21:46
article i’m going to put it
21:47
up on the screen so people are watching
21:49
it yes if you’re not watching it i’m
21:51
just putting the article back on screen
21:52
because i want to go through
21:54
some of the stats that you share in this
21:56
article so
21:58
680 asian hate crimes this is in canada
22:01
folks
22:02
just want to make you aware 643 reported
22:05
cases
22:06
from march 10th to december 31st 2020
22:10
73 verbal harassment
22:16
that’s high that yes that is the most
22:19
common
22:23
when you when you saw and i’ll ask it
22:26
now i could ask in the end
22:28
when you saw these figures how did it
22:31
impact you
22:33
as a journalist and how did it
22:36
act impact you as asian
22:41
as a journalist i i saw these numbers
22:44
and was like these need to be reported
22:46
on i don’t
22:47
see these numbers anyone talking about
22:50
like this these stats ever
22:52
all i hear is that it’s just this
22:54
incident here and this incident there
22:55
i’m not seeing
22:56
the statistics of how many incidents
22:58
happened in the past
23:00
you know a couple months and how many of
23:01
those what are the breakdowns
23:03
of who was affected and how i i felt
23:06
like this was an
23:07
important information as a journalist
23:09
for the public to know
23:10
and as an asian person i wasn’t
23:13
surprised
23:14
to see the numbers i i think that this
23:16
is something i already
23:18
felt was true without seeing the stats
23:22
like i i had a feeling just from like
23:24
family
23:26
conversations of those who are in areas
23:28
where they’re more likely to
23:30
happen just conversations from that
23:32
alone i felt like
23:34
yeah these statistics make sense these
23:36
numbers make sense to me
23:38
and it’s unfortunate and over the
23:40
reporting period 59
23:42
were women
23:47
that’s crazy and then 84
23:50
east asians and a very interesting thing
23:52
here
23:53
the majority incidents took place in
23:56
public spaces that’s pretty brazen
23:59
maybe yes but one thing that the report
24:03
points out and and i i was
24:04
trying to figure out a way to put this
24:06
in the story but i guess i can share it
24:07
now
24:08
they they felt that that statistic
24:11
showed that a lot of discrimination
24:14
against
24:14
minorities or people of color is to
24:18
restrict them
24:19
from access to public spaces like they
24:21
do not want
24:22
to see people in public spaces and that
24:24
they they believe that may be one of the
24:26
motives as to why they happen often
24:28
in public spaces it’s to show that
24:31
publicly they don’t want you there or
24:33
they don’t want you
24:34
in canada in general and as i’m looking
24:37
at your
24:38
numbers the numbers here more deep
24:40
giving a deeper dive
24:41
49 in public spaces
24:45
percent in grocery stores are food
24:46
assessments that’s still to me a public
24:48
spray
24:49
space then again ten percent public
24:52
transit
24:53
eight percent public stores so when i
24:55
went to school
24:56
49 and 17 to 63 63 and 18
25:00
is 81. wow i still have a computer in my
25:03
head
25:04
so the large majority
25:07
of these cases happened in public places
25:14
that’s crazy yeah and like unfortunately
25:17
like nobody steps in from the reports
25:19
that i’ve i was reading
25:21
a lot of the times like no flipping them
25:24
they’re just kind of on their own or
25:25
have to just walk away from it on their
25:27
own and i
25:29
i just don’t understand how you can
25:31
treat someone like that
25:32
in public or in private yeah well that’s
25:36
yeah and uh got a comment here from uh
25:40
twitter racism as a whole around the
25:42
world has not been addressed to be rid
25:45
of it
25:46
absolutely it’s good stuff thank you
25:48
real django
25:50
very big supporter of the dr vibe show
25:52
uh
25:54
when you did this article
25:58
were there any moments that made you say
26:02
wow that really impacted you
26:05
that hit you emotionally
26:09
i would have to say a lot of the things
26:11
that
26:12
hit me emotionally were reading the
26:14
report
26:15
because they not only had statistics and
26:17
suggestions and recommendations to
26:19
address the issue
26:20
they also had quotes from the people
26:23
that reported these cases
26:25
anonymous but you know there’s still
26:27
people who who experience these things
26:29
and a lot of those quotes
26:32
just remembering that makes me very you
26:35
know
26:35
emotional to think that this could have
26:37
happened to anyone i know
26:39
and this in fact did happen to people in
26:41
my own community so it’s just
26:43
heartbreaking to hear
26:44
words that were said to these people
26:47
things that were done to them in public
26:49
even though people were watching like
26:51
it’s
26:52
i i have no words for it it’s it is
26:55
something that kind of
26:56
really hit me like hit hit home for me
26:59
sure i can tell you’re a little bit
27:01
emotional speaking about it sharing
27:03
about it today so
27:04
i appreciate your being open and honest
27:07
with with the audience so
27:09
appreciate it and not taken for granted
27:11
um
27:12
what was a one or two memorable moments
27:14
in doing this article
27:16
that you can share with our audience um
27:19
one memorable moment
27:21
was um speaking with
27:24
the police where it’s kind of like a
27:26
thing i knew probably wouldn’t really
27:27
happen
27:28
um and i was right i just got a lot of
27:30
email statements and data that the
27:31
police had collected and no one really
27:33
wanted to talk to me
27:34
personally were you surprised no i
27:37
wasn’t surprised i
27:39
saw that coming but what i was surprised
27:42
was when i had contacted
27:43
the ottawa police station and somebody
27:47
who was
27:48
a fellow raven called me and told me to
27:51
call or like i guess told me to call
27:53
them
27:53
to talk about it so he was a source i
27:55
mentioned in the story
27:57
he is the sorry he’s a sergeant of the
28:00
hate and bias crime unit there and he
28:02
had a conversation with me about like
28:04
he’s trying to figure out how to get
28:05
people to report it because he
28:06
understands that
28:07
it’s going unreported it’s heavily
28:10
unreported in ottawa
28:12
and i remember having a conversation
28:14
with the police officer about that was
28:16
very eye-opening to me that he took the
28:17
time when so many other
28:19
police officers i had reached out to or
28:21
police departments just kind of gave me
28:23
statements or emails which i appreciated
28:25
at least but it’s very different to have
28:27
a phone call about it and to have him
28:29
feel like he understood what was what i
28:32
was coming from or where i was coming
28:34
from and trying to have a conversation
28:35
with me about how he could help
28:37
in any way so that was that was a
28:39
memorable moment for me yeah and i want
28:41
to just
28:42
sit on that for a second was it that
28:45
these incidents
28:47
were not being reported or were they
28:49
being reported and the
28:51
department is not doing anything with
28:54
the reports
28:55
in your opinion i mean i don’t i can’t
28:58
really say if they’re not doing anything
29:00
with the reports i don’t have that
29:01
information and if i had asked i don’t
29:03
know if i would have gotten an
29:04
answer but i do know that
29:07
it seems they understand it’s going
29:10
unreported um
29:11
and i think a lot of police departments
29:14
did tell me
29:15
that they they understood it was being
29:17
unreported but that does remind me of
29:19
something that
29:20
ellen who had said in the story i’m not
29:22
sure if i included it but she was
29:23
telling me like
29:24
why is it that the police don’t realize
29:27
that this information like reported
29:29
information is here it’s just not being
29:31
reported to them
29:33
right like they have that information
29:35
these organizations have the data
29:37
this just may not be reported to their
29:39
local police
29:41
now there are feedback from the audience
29:43
uh david hughes from australia
29:47
saying people are cruel difference ought
29:49
to be celebrated not demean
29:51
for me there is no them and us there are
29:53
only we
29:54
that’s that is definitely from the
29:56
that’s david the david i know so
29:58
thank you for that common david and hope
30:00
all is well
30:01
in australia and actually i’ll pull
30:04
something out
30:05
i just started watching one of my
30:06
favorite shows tonight masterchef
30:08
australia
30:09
i’m a huge fan of that show so nothing
30:12
just happens david yeah that’s like one
30:14
of my
30:15
favorite shows absolutely so hope all is
30:17
fine with you and your family david this
30:19
is good this is good
30:20
did you receive any pushback from
30:23
any sources or people while doing this
30:26
story
30:28
thankfully no i think the only
30:31
pushback i really had where i was trying
30:34
to
30:34
talk to people who actually experienced
30:37
an anti-asian hate crime
30:39
and i was trying to find people who are
30:40
willing to speak about that and
30:42
as anyone who’s read the article i
30:44
couldn’t really find anyone willing to
30:46
and i wasn’t going to push anyone to
30:47
share
30:48
i feel like this has to be something
30:50
that they are willing to talk about and
30:52
it is a hard subject so i understand
30:53
that not a lot of people wanted to come
30:55
forward about that
30:56
so i think that was the only issue i
30:59
really had
31:00
how easy was it to pitch this story to
31:03
street voices
31:05
i would say pretty easy especially
31:07
because street voices
31:09
really does focus on helping and
31:12
empowering or
31:13
amplifying voices who are marginalized
31:16
or underrepresented so
31:17
this story was definitely in line with
31:20
what they wanted
31:21
so there was no issues it was approved
31:23
of almost immediately
31:25
very nice uh when you
31:29
finished that story
31:32
how did it feel
31:36
it felt rewarding and it felt good to
31:38
have it done
31:39
because i think there was a part of me
31:42
mentally working on a story that’s like
31:44
very
31:44
sad and and kind of hits home for like
31:47
four weeks can really do something to
31:48
you emotionally
31:50
yeah so it was good to have it out of
31:51
the way but it was very rewarding to
31:53
have it done
31:54
and up and see the people’s responses to
31:56
it
31:58
nice would you say
32:01
of the stories you’ve done this has been
32:03
the most
32:05
personally and professionally impactful
32:09
i would say so far yes i think this is
32:12
one that is in line with
32:14
what i wanted to do as a journalist
32:16
something that’s more
32:17
hard-hitting news and it’s something
32:19
that fulfills
32:20
for me personally in my identity as well
32:23
to be able to
32:24
to bring light to an issue that’s
32:26
impacting my own community
32:29
did you tell you when did you tell your
32:31
parents
32:32
about the story and when you told them
32:35
what was their reaction and what was
32:36
their reaction
32:38
i’m not making assumptions have they
32:39
read the article
32:42
oh no ria don’t don’t don’t do that to
32:46
me
32:49
don’t make me out to come to trenton and
32:51
show them come on now
32:53
so my i remember telling my parents that
32:56
i was working on the story
32:57
and um they were they’re very used to me
33:00
working on things where they’re like
33:02
okay okay those are hard-hitting topics
33:05
like that’s they’re used to that so they
33:06
weren’t surprised that i was gonna talk
33:08
about it they had no concerns
33:10
they were a little impressed that i went
33:12
for it actually so that was good
33:14
a good feeling that they were like okay
33:15
she’s actually going for something where
33:17
she might have to talk to the police
33:18
about it so that was
33:19
intriguing for them when the article
33:22
came out i
33:23
actually cannot i don’t think they read
33:25
it but i remember
33:26
showing it to them i’m not sure they
33:29
read through the whole thing yet
33:31
you better be careful because if i come
33:33
with a trend i’m gonna find out where
33:34
they live
33:36
i’m gonna say look at look at my screen
33:40
this is your daughter here this is my
33:43
screen
33:46
my parents you know they they have they
33:48
have a lot going on they’re still very
33:50
busy
33:50
just you know working so i understand
33:52
they don’t really have the time to read
33:53
the full article but i kind of gave them
33:55
the summary and they were they were very
33:57
impressed by it so that’s good i shared
33:59
it to my social media a lot of my family
34:01
members shared it so
34:02
i got some good feedback from my own
34:04
family who enjoyed it congratulations on
34:07
that by the way
34:08
thank you so much that that that’s huge
34:11
and uh
34:12
off offline i think i’m going to see if
34:14
i can get it put on some other
34:15
publications so i think it’s a very
34:17
appreciate that
34:18
very very important i want to shift to
34:22
what is life like
34:25
in the asian community have like day to
34:27
day
34:28
because obviously this story
34:31
shows a part and a lot of people like
34:34
david in australia other people like rio
34:37
dango in the united states
34:39
hear about canada being racism canada
34:42
like what what’s going on here like
34:46
it doesn’t it’s we’re known as a good
34:48
country per se
34:50
what are some of the day-to-day
34:52
challenges
34:54
that you maybe personally or the people
34:56
you spoke with in the story have to deal
34:58
with when it comes to
35:00
racism in canadian society
35:05
um i think i i i can speak for my
35:08
my own experiences like one of the
35:11
struggles i felt
35:12
was almost like an imposter
35:16
syndrome because of the stereotypes like
35:18
asian people face
35:19
and i’m sure you might be you might be
35:22
familiar with hearing some of these is
35:23
that
35:24
a lot of the times asian people are
35:26
expected to excel
35:28
and and do well in certain subjects in
35:30
school so i remember
35:32
if i did well in school it wasn’t
35:35
ever like celebrated the same way my
35:37
peers would be celebrated if they did
35:39
they did well i would just be met with
35:41
like a oh well you were supposed to be
35:43
good at that
35:44
because you’re asian so you like your
35:45
own victories are never credited
35:48
um they’re just downplayed because of
35:50
the stereotype
35:52
or if you fail it’s it’s downplayed even
35:55
or it’s like made fun of even more
35:57
because like oh you’re asian you’re
35:59
supposed to do well i did better than
36:00
you like you get put down
36:02
further and i remember you know this
36:05
weird like
36:06
if i’m not doing well enough then i’m
36:08
not like asian enough or if i’m not
36:12
or if i am doing well like that doesn’t
36:14
matter because it’s because i’m asian so
36:16
it was like this really weird
36:18
imposter syndrome i guess is the best
36:20
way i could i could describe it and
36:22
that’s just like one
36:23
factor and i’m sure more people have
36:26
other other things that they can
36:27
identify as a struggle
36:29
um or just the fact that like sometimes
36:31
people just don’t think you speak
36:33
english
36:34
that was another thing i remember like
36:36
being in my
36:37
local walmart in trenton that i had been
36:40
in my whole life essentially raised
36:41
there
36:42
and being approached by a lady who asked
36:43
me if i could speak english
36:45
and i just i didn’t really know like how
36:48
to respond other than being like
36:51
yeah of course i do wow
36:55
so got some encouraging words from here
36:57
real django says
36:58
i’m reading more of your articles right
36:59
now ria i’ll be sharing more on twitter
37:02
thank you i appreciate that yeah we have
37:05
a good family we got a good family here
37:06
dr vibe show
37:10
your parents and the elders
37:14
yes uh what do they think about this
37:18
issue is it something even they even
37:19
talk about
37:20
compared to maybe your generation it
37:22
sounds like you talk about it
37:24
more do the parents and the elders ever
37:28
talk about it
37:29
at all uh
37:32
i think it depends because for me
37:35
i i come from a family that is very
37:38
aware
37:39
of of the news and they follow and all
37:41
those things so i
37:42
grew up having those conversations with
37:43
my with my my dad specifically and my
37:46
mom would join in when she could
37:48
um but i guess it’s very different from
37:51
from each
37:52
like house to house because i had that
37:53
experience but then i talked to my
37:55
friends and their parents like
37:57
don’t know about it or they don’t really
37:58
talk about it or they try not to think
38:00
about it
38:01
so it is different for for different
38:03
people
38:05
wow i want to move on a little bit to
38:08
the whole area of journalism sure
38:11
and uh you’re a graduate yeah yeah
38:14
yeah yeah thank you uh what are some of
38:18
the current concerns you have
38:20
and you can be as comfortable or if you
38:22
don’t need to want to talk about this
38:24
but what do you have do you have any
38:26
concerns about
38:27
the lack of coverage of this subject
38:30
in canadian journalism and
38:34
if you do have a concern do you have any
38:37
reasons why we’re not hearing about it
38:39
more i i do
38:42
have a concern that not even just asian
38:45
issues i think just like any
38:48
like marginalized group i feel is
38:50
underrepresented in mainstream media
38:52
and i we’ve had a lot of these
38:53
conversations on on our podcast as well
38:56
and
38:56
just with other friends in media
38:59
and i think for all of us really it just
39:02
kind of stems
39:03
from we believe that it’s just the
39:06
people in
39:07
power so like in mainstream media the
39:09
people at the top
39:10
are just not diverse enough or open
39:12
enough
39:13
to take on stories that are part maybe
39:16
of the
39:16
focused on the asian community or the
39:18
black community or any other community
39:20
like
39:21
we just think that uh those higher ups
39:24
don’t see news value in those
39:28
community stories and that’s something
39:30
that needs to be changed
39:33
what if if the media
39:37
landscape was the way the way
39:41
in you wanted it to be and look
39:45
what would it look like if you had the
39:48
ideal
39:49
if we had the ideal vision
39:52
of the canadian media landscape what
39:54
would it look like
39:57
that is a tough question i think my main
40:01
like place where i’m going that with
40:03
that in my head is that it’s just
40:05
overall more diverse in racial
40:08
identities sexual identities
40:10
gender identities just so that we have
40:13
you know those stories being represented
40:15
so if we don’t see people in that space
40:18
we won’t see those types of stories
40:21
being told
40:22
because they’re there’s no one to
40:23
understand why that story is important
40:26
or
40:26
or no one to have the knowledge of like
40:29
how to be sensitive about these issues
40:30
while still reporting on them
40:32
so i think mainly and i know this word
40:34
is overused but like diversity is kind
40:36
of the main goal and
40:38
i don’t know how to really define
40:40
diversity in a media landscape that
40:42
would be
40:42
you know satisfactory for everybody but
40:45
just like aiming for it
40:46
in some way sure sure
40:50
i want to transition to the azn
40:54
connection podcast see i said it right
40:57
yes you did tell us so how it came about
41:00
and what is it all about
41:02
sure so um i actually wasn’t a part of
41:05
the
41:06
show in the initial discussions so this
41:07
actually the start of the show
41:09
actually starts with the other two
41:10
co-hosts which are
41:12
jeff tram and john gallardo who are two
41:14
friends of mine
41:15
from journalism school and they had
41:17
known each other a bit longer
41:20
in the carlton journalism school
41:22
landscape and they actually had their
41:24
own
41:25
sports podcast previously that they’re
41:27
still working on
41:29
they were kind of in the talks of you
41:32
know
41:33
being asian asian identity and like not
41:36
really knowing that much about it or
41:38
or not seeing that much about it and
41:39
they decided they wanted to do their own
41:41
podcast about it
41:42
um and they also started looking for
41:45
another voice so it wouldn’t just be the
41:48
two of them
41:49
and so john actually had reached out to
41:51
me and told me about the idea
41:52
and that they were looking for someone
41:54
else to come on and that’s how i
41:56
joined them so i became a co-host with
41:58
them
42:00
what was the first episode about that
42:02
you were on
42:03
uh yeah so that would be like the in the
42:06
very first
42:06
episode we did which was just
42:08
introducing ourselves
42:10
the concept of the show and just about
42:13
like growing up asian in canada
42:16
okay and are you enjoying it yes i very
42:20
much
42:20
do enjoy being a part of that podcast it
42:22
is it is something that
42:24
um we are as a team very passionate
42:26
about and very excited to see it grow
42:29
and what type of topics do you cover on
42:31
the on the podcast
42:34
we cover a lot of topics we have like a
42:36
master list of things we covered or want
42:38
to cover
42:39
so it’s really a range we do interview
42:42
style we also do conversational
42:44
styles of topics so we’ve done stuff
42:46
about
42:47
asian racism we’ve done stuff about
42:49
growing up asian
42:50
we’ve done stuff about you know what
42:53
it’s like to
42:54
to do the celebrations like lunar new
42:56
year or chinese new year or
42:58
filipino christmas so far those are some
43:01
popular episodes people have listened to
43:04
nice nice uh
43:07
give us a special moment from the
43:09
podcast so far that you’ve experienced
43:14
i think my special moment would probably
43:16
be like right after we released the
43:19
first episode and it was just the three
43:20
of us talking about
43:22
you know our plans with the show and who
43:24
we were for our audience to know who we
43:26
were
43:27
and just seeing that initial response
43:29
and seeing people
43:30
get excited about it and sharing it that
43:32
was a special moment for me
43:35
nice nice uh
43:38
tell tell us the experiences or what are
43:41
younger
43:43
members of the asian community what is
43:45
what’s going on in their hearts and
43:46
minds
43:46
in regards to when it comes to racism or
43:49
the ones that
43:50
the individuals that you come in contact
43:52
with what are their thoughts of what’s
43:53
going
43:54
on in the landscape when it comes to
43:56
anti-asian racism
43:58
what are they thinking what are they
43:59
wanting to do how are they how are they
44:01
handling it
44:04
i think i’ve seen more uh
44:07
younger asian people now more than ever
44:09
taking a stance
44:10
um and you know as i was mentioning
44:13
earlier there was this
44:14
kind of cultural feeling of like just
44:17
don’t talk about it just keep your head
44:18
down
44:19
but now more than ever i see people
44:21
talking more and people posting more
44:23
people maybe i didn’t even suspect in my
44:25
own circle to talk about it
44:27
are now talking about it and that’s
44:28
that’s been a great thing to see
44:31
in terms of what they want to do i think
44:33
it’s mainly they just want to
44:35
bring attention to it and they want to
44:38
have people be aware of this
44:39
issue because i think from conversations
44:42
i’ve had a lot of us feel like
44:44
just a lot of canada just doesn’t
44:45
realize it’s happening or they had no
44:47
clue
44:48
i remember when i posted the article i
44:50
did have a couple friends
44:52
who aren’t in the asian community did
44:54
express to me they had no idea it was
44:55
happening at this scale
44:57
so that’s one of the things that i was
44:59
hoping to do was to bring attention to
45:01
it
45:02
well done well done have another comment
45:04
here from david in australia
45:06
i’m a little shocked that there is an
45:08
anti-asian
45:09
pro racism problem in canada in the
45:12
united states i read
45:13
i see it and read about it canada i
45:15
didn’t know i see it in australia we
45:17
have a rising white supremacist problem
45:19
here
45:20
i’m a father to an adopted child from
45:22
central america
45:23
and i’ve seen racism first hand when my
45:25
son was small i speak up against it
45:28
some some of my quote so-called unquote
45:31
friends don’t like it
45:32
that’s about them though
45:37
do the asian community feel
45:40
they’re getting support from other
45:42
communities or is this something they
45:44
feel that they’re
45:45
bearing on their own
45:48
it’s like for me i remember the first
45:52
half of 2020 when this was happening i
45:55
felt like
45:56
we were having our backs like people
45:58
were turning their backs on us
46:00
i felt like other minority communities
46:03
like i’m not saying all of them right
46:05
that some people did speak up some
46:06
people were aware
46:08
but i i i saw like a really upsetting
46:11
amount of posts
46:12
on on the internet kind of justifying
46:16
the racism towards asian people and
46:19
i’m not and i understand where they’re
46:21
coming from where they’re saying that
46:23
like you know asian people
46:24
don’t really talk about other issues
46:26
outside of
46:27
you know asian issues they’re too
46:29
focused on their own and i get that and
46:30
that is something that needs to be
46:32
addressed in our own community for sure
46:34
but it was it was something in the
46:36
beginning that i think
46:38
people just didn’t really want to talk
46:40
or help
46:41
but i think now um as time has gone on
46:44
and it’s being
46:45
proven that like this is a real issue i
46:47
think more and more people
46:48
are coming on and and talking about it
46:50
that are not of the asian community
46:54
wow that’s uh that’s it it’s tough
46:59
this is tough this is very very tough
47:01
and it’s something that’s not
47:03
obviously being recognized as much as it
47:06
should be
47:08
and i it’s really i’m
47:11
disappointed let’s put it that way that
47:14
things are not better
47:15
uh as we keep on going here let’s go
47:18
back to the world of media
47:20
uh you’re a graduate
47:23
how is and obviously this is your
47:25
passion
47:27
um what are your thoughts of the
47:29
canadian media landscape
47:31
these days especially for young people
47:33
like yourself
47:37
i mean i to be honest i never really had
47:40
much hope
47:40
for the canadian media landscape as an
47:43
understanding
47:44
i i very much felt like i would have
47:47
a struggle to be a part of it i i didn’t
47:50
think after graduating i would be
47:52
in the media landscape at all i kind of
47:54
thought i would be like i don’t know
47:57
an airline stewardess for a little bit
47:59
like i was thinking of other career
48:01
paths just in case
48:03
and i remember like as soon as i i was
48:05
already thinking that before the
48:06
pandemic so as soon as like the pandemic
48:08
hit
48:09
i was like devastated but you know plans
48:12
for even just a non-journalism job were
48:15
kind of out the window
48:16
but in a weird way the pandemic kind of
48:19
did give me a chance to
48:20
to work on journalism safely so that is
48:23
something that i’ll give them
48:25
i i do work from home as a journalist so
48:27
i’m very thankful for that
48:29
sure but there are some things about the
48:33
media landscape that i question if
48:35
sometimes if i really want to be a part
48:36
of mainstream at all actually
48:39
uh do you feel
48:45
going your own route being an
48:47
independent or maybe going outside of
48:49
canadians
48:51
landscape is where your future is if you
48:53
want to pursue this journey
48:56
um i i can’t really say like
48:59
again i you just never know how life
49:02
takes you
49:03
or where the world will go anymore so i
49:05
think it’s kind of hard to say for sure
49:07
there’s just like an element of needing
49:09
to adapt so if it has to be
49:11
you know going on your own way and doing
49:13
independent things
49:15
such as the podcast so yeah and i do
49:17
enjoy that podcast as well
49:19
but and if it if i do end up in
49:22
something more like
49:23
i guess stable in mainstream media
49:27
that that is a possibility who really
49:29
knows anymore
49:30
okay david from australia says where can
49:33
i read the article please
49:34
i can talk about it at my tote in my
49:36
toastmaster groups
49:38
so david what i’m gonna do is after we
49:40
finish i will dm you
49:42
the actual link for the article so
49:44
you’ll have it within the hour
49:47
so you will make sure and i know that uh
49:50
we appreciate your interest and your and
49:53
your support
49:54
both yourself and real django but that’s
49:57
all we’re about that’s what the doctor
49:58
family my family is all about we support
50:00
each other whatever way we can
50:02
so and he says me too doctor thank you
50:06
much appreciated absolutely fantastic
50:10
so how did the gig come with street
50:12
voices
50:14
through a friend so like as i was saying
50:17
jeff uh who is a host on asian
50:19
connection
50:19
actually started at street voices first
50:22
um
50:23
and then he then brought on john and i
50:26
as part of the media team
50:27
afterwards so that’s that’s how that
50:29
started
50:30
and how you enjoying it it’s been good
50:33
it’s been a good
50:34
chance to to write more when i was in my
50:37
other position i wasn’t really writing
50:39
as often
50:40
just because there were more tasks to do
50:42
involved with that position but this one
50:44
i’ve been able to explore writing more
50:46
and just
50:47
kind of doing more interviews and
50:48
speaking to people so i really enjoyed
50:50
that
50:51
fantastic fantastic this is good
50:55
how how has the pandemic treated you
50:58
journalistic wise
51:02
it has been weird um
51:05
because i’m so used to you know the
51:07
carlton journalism kind of
51:09
ingraining it in your head to be like
51:11
you have to meet people in person
51:13
in order to to get a really good
51:15
interview and i’ve been following that
51:17
like my whole time in school but like
51:19
during the pandemic it’s
51:21
it’s just been meeting people over the
51:22
phone or during or on a zoom call and
51:24
that’s
51:26
although that is good it’s just kind of
51:28
not the same as like
51:29
being able to interact with people in
51:30
real life and seeing
51:32
their spaces like where whether that’s
51:34
their office or their
51:36
home to learn more about them in their
51:37
environment so that’s been one thing the
51:39
pandemic has kind of
51:40
hindered on or being able to take their
51:42
photos for the articles
51:44
as well that’s that’s been you know kind
51:47
of not happening anymore no
51:49
no not really happening at all uh
51:53
we’re going to start winding it down
51:54
here because i know you’ve had a long
51:56
day so i don’t want to
51:57
keep you all around for too long
52:00
what is one of the biggest
52:02
misconceptions
52:05
non-asians have about asians
52:11
[Music]
52:13
one that you hear about all the time
52:15
that is just not true
52:20
huh i think that’s a hard one i don’t i
52:22
can’t really think of one off the top of
52:24
my head that is like a major
52:27
misunderstanding oh i think one
52:29
misunderstanding for me is that they
52:31
feel like
52:32
they’ll have nothing in common with us
52:34
and i think
52:35
that that’s that’s a major thing is i
52:38
think
52:38
more people feel like asian culture is
52:41
like too different like it’s not gonna
52:42
they’re not gonna find something similar
52:44
in their own culture but i think
52:46
if you have a conversation with any
52:48
asian person about their culture and
52:49
their family you’ll find
52:51
something similar something to relate to
52:54
i think that’s so true and i’m going to
52:56
bring my journey
52:57
into this i think when you and i spoke a
52:59
while back um
53:01
folks here when i was younger i and i
53:03
had hair
53:04
i used to do a uh a lot of refereeing in
53:07
the
53:08
chinese and filipino community
53:11
and so many great times
53:15
so many great relationships and i
53:18
so i really want to build on what ria
53:20
just said there that
53:21
the more you know about you the more you
53:23
need to know we have more in common than
53:25
we don’t
53:26
think we do there’s a lot of things
53:29
most human beings have a number of
53:32
things in common
53:33
they want people to be better they want
53:35
to treat you with respect
53:36
that’s not a cultural thing that’s a
53:38
human thing
53:41
and uh filipino people love to have a
53:43
good time i like to have a good time
53:48
you know they’re then they’re very the
53:51
filipino people i know
53:52
very family oriented
53:55
very very familiar so i think that is
53:58
this in some other cultures too i don’t
53:59
think that’s just a filipino thing
54:01
you know so i’m just saying
54:05
that rio django saying communicating
54:07
with others is
54:08
so important dr v absolutely
54:12
much respect so rhea you wrote this
54:15
article
54:16
we’ve touched on a little bit i didn’t
54:17
want to get too deep in because i want
54:19
people to read it
54:21
uh what are some what are some calls to
54:24
action you would have
54:26
for not only people who are reading this
54:28
article in canada
54:29
or in fact globally what are some calls
54:33
actions
54:34
you would like to share with some people
54:35
when it comes to
54:37
anti-asian racism excuse me
54:41
sure uh this the first one that came to
54:43
mind was just
54:44
educating yourself i think the main
54:47
issue
54:48
of anti-asian racism is that people are
54:50
just unaware
54:51
or uninformed and i think though the one
54:54
action that i think
54:55
everyone is capable of doing is just
54:57
educating themselves
54:59
bringing themselves out of that bubble
55:00
reading more about issues that affect
55:02
people that are not like that don’t look
55:04
like you just so you can
55:06
be a better ally to them nice
55:09
very very nice and david is saying all
55:12
people are 95 more similar than they are
55:15
different
55:17
i agree with that that’s a very it’s a
55:20
very good point
55:21
very very good point so young lady
55:24
closing thoughts before you
55:26
just you rock the house tonight what are
55:28
some closing thoughts you have
55:30
for our audience
55:33
just thank you so much for taking your
55:35
time to listen to me today
55:37
and thank you dr bye for having me on to
55:39
talk about myself and the article i
55:40
really appreciate it
55:42
and i just hope that if it’s not just
55:44
anti-aging issues i hope everyone
55:47
does read about something that doesn’t
55:48
impact them and learn more about other
55:50
people
55:52
excellent so for people who are watching
55:54
live on the replay i’m putting up her
55:56
instagram
55:57
and handle and it’s at r h
56:00
e a l i s o n d r a
56:04
on twitter it’s at r h e a
56:07
underscore l i s o n d r a
56:11
uh the podcast a z n connection podcast
56:16
and then you can reach a lot of her
56:18
great stuff at street voices dot
56:20
ca that’s street voices
56:24
dot ca ria as we said before went live
56:28
i didn’t know it would end up like this
56:32
but i thank you for reaching out to
56:34
interview me
56:35
and i said to you then and i’m gonna say
56:38
now live and continuous
56:39
anything i can do to help you personally
56:42
or professionally
56:43
as you go along your journey we’re here
56:45
to serve
56:47
because we want to see you and your win
56:49
you win
56:50
and your community win because if they
56:53
win we all win
56:56
i’m very thankful for that thank you so
56:58
much
56:59
and i i’m uh and i’m putting it out
57:02
there anytime you write a story
57:03
we want you here i’m being serious
57:08
sure what right here you have a home
57:11
here
57:12
i’m i’m very happy to hear that no thank
57:14
you all right
57:15
take care you as well thank you so much
57:19
it is the dr vibe show the home of epic
57:21
conversations on the host of
57:23
epic conversations 2020 best podcast
57:27
used in 2018 innovation award winner
57:30
getting out by the canadian ethnic
57:31
media association that’s how i met ria
57:34
she would did an article on me
57:35
and i am totally totally jacked still
57:39
that that was done
57:41
just want to say a few things before we
57:42
jump off here i’d like to say thank you
57:44
to real django
57:45
and also to david hughes from australia
57:48
for watching and supporting live if and
57:51
other people watch but i forgot your
57:52
name it’s my head not my heart
57:55
so a few things if you want to reach
57:56
with me or touch base with me
57:59
there you go thedoctorvibeshow.com
58:02
is the best place to go all things dr
58:04
vibe there
58:07
and as always i will close off with this
58:11
live your life as a dream if you can
58:12
dream it sometimes you have to get small
58:14
to get stronger
58:16
block assumptions and aim bigger and
58:19
better aim higher and wider
58:22
let me just say here got some final
58:25
comments people still coming in with the
58:27
comments this is beautiful
58:29
love it we got david hughes real dango
58:32
is clapping applause and also
58:36
win-win thanks again dr vibe stay safe
58:38
and stay
58:39
well appreciate that family and as i
58:42
said
58:43
my as my last things love faith and
58:46
respect
58:48
and also remember to give yourself grace
58:50
i don’t know if i said it but i’ll say
58:52
it again
58:53
live your life as a dream if you can
58:54
dream it you can make it sometimes you
58:56
have to get smaller to get stronger
58:58
block assumptions and aim bigger and
59:00
better
59:01
him higher and wider god bless peace you
59:04
will keep the faith and walk good
59:06
and especially these days yeah stay safe
59:09
stay
59:09
safe we’re in very interesting times
59:12
physically and
59:14
other ways so just want to make sure you
59:17
do good
59:18
bye everybody
59:32
[Music]
59:44
so
59:46
[Music]
60:06
you
***
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